Can you believe that I was almost late for the first day of training? All of our crew was there in plenty of time, but I was still gathering "stuff" and forgot that I had to drive through morning rush-hour traffic. On-time I was, though.
The Specialist: impressive. He didn't use the AOTC book at all, but he didn't need to. Very knowledgeable, fluid in presentation of material, he kept a good pace going throughout the day without getting ahead of anyone, immediately had answers to all questions, and seems like a helluva nice guy too.
We also have an Apprentice Specialist attending the training also who will be striking out on his own after he finishes his Jedi training. He knows his stuff and had input of his own at key points during the day.
The Sales Rep. stopped by and chatted for a few minutes even though he didn't need to, but our Project Manager never once stopped by. I found that odd since, after all, he's the Project Manager for our implementation.
For the most part, everything ran very smoothly for us as well. A few small snags, but less than I thought there would be for the AutoCAD users. Our lone engineer in attendance did better than everyone else (except me maybe?) and he has almost no AutoCAD experience. He attributed it to the fact that he's very used to the 3D modeling process because of using RAM for structural analysis. It makes perfect sense to me. That aside, it is no surprise to me that he picked it right up. He's not where he is because of a coin flip.
This entry is entitled Part I because that is all I'm going to say about today's training for now. There are a couple of items that I'm checking on before I comment further, lest I put my big-fat-foot in my just-as-big-fat mouth. Sometimes I can be a little quick to defend my position (and our $$$ investment!), but I'm going to wait. For now. I want to give them the benefit of the doubt until then - especially when I could be mistaken. Not wrong: just mistaken.
Let's just say that I don't feel all warm and fuzzy about a few things, but we'll see what develops.
Tune in again tomorrow night. I hope you'll hear me humble myself again.
Time for me to make like a tree and 'leave.' Go Celtics!
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
Training Prep
In order to prep for the classroom training, I opted to have everyone complete as many of the eLearning exercises on the Subscription website as possible. The first one I had them go through was Exploring the User Interface - since you can't do much (effectively) without being familiar with the program. I went through them also (as a needed refresher) since it has been a while for me, too. This should mean fewer slowdowns during the training - I hope.
It was recommended by our Implementors (?) to try the Getting Started with Revit Structure 2009 booklet that is included with the DVD, but that is more for someone at least a little familiar with the program. And, just for the record, there are a couple of mistakes that easily confused our novices when they tried that before the eLearning mini-courses. I would point them out, but I can't remember them exactly. I do remember that one called out the wrong elevation marker to use (or was very vague in the description - north instead of south, maybe?) and consequently ended up with the grids showing reversed from what they showed in the picture. You should've seen the puzzled looks I got.
One thing to mention about the eLearning exercises: we all had some major issues trying to get the Simulations to work and were forced to use the Application to complete them. There is nothing really wrong with that, but if they give you the option to do it either way, they (Autodesk) should make sure that it works either way. I say that it's their issue because we tried on at least ten computers (all 6 of our work computers and most of our home computers as well) and had a very low success rate using the Simulations anywhere with either XP or Vista. If you try it, definitely use Internet Explorer as Autodesk is one of those sites that doesn't always play nice with Firefox (unfortunately). The only times it worked for us was with IE7. Score 1 more for Bill Gates & Co.
Like he needs any more points.
Confidence Level going into the classroom: High.
It was recommended by our Implementors (?) to try the Getting Started with Revit Structure 2009 booklet that is included with the DVD, but that is more for someone at least a little familiar with the program. And, just for the record, there are a couple of mistakes that easily confused our novices when they tried that before the eLearning mini-courses. I would point them out, but I can't remember them exactly. I do remember that one called out the wrong elevation marker to use (or was very vague in the description - north instead of south, maybe?) and consequently ended up with the grids showing reversed from what they showed in the picture. You should've seen the puzzled looks I got.
One thing to mention about the eLearning exercises: we all had some major issues trying to get the Simulations to work and were forced to use the Application to complete them. There is nothing really wrong with that, but if they give you the option to do it either way, they (Autodesk) should make sure that it works either way. I say that it's their issue because we tried on at least ten computers (all 6 of our work computers and most of our home computers as well) and had a very low success rate using the Simulations anywhere with either XP or Vista. If you try it, definitely use Internet Explorer as Autodesk is one of those sites that doesn't always play nice with Firefox (unfortunately). The only times it worked for us was with IE7. Score 1 more for Bill Gates & Co.
Like he needs any more points.
Confidence Level going into the classroom: High.
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
Kicked-Off
We are officially underway. Over the course of the last two days, I've had a conference call with 'The Specialist' in Texas, a few conversations with our Project Manager & the Sales Rep (from their local office), some e-mails, an FTP posting, and a few more emails.
The results? My doubts are hereby (almost) completely withdrawn.
What I thought was going to be tough to fit into the 2 weeks before our training starts will be taken care of without a problem.
What I thought was going to be 2 days worth of work in our office actually only took me a few hours.
Sometimes I think too much. Ya' think maybe?
Why? Because the Specialist will be creating the content we need (on his computer down in the heart of Texas) prior to the commencement of training. I uploaded a package of all that he needed, which included things like logos, linetype settings, layering info, text/dimension samples, and a number of other things. Standard stuff, really. But then, what else do you make templates out of anyway?
So, all I'm going to do now is try to get a little background "intro-training" for my people so they don't go into the classroom totally cold. If we go in there ahead of the game, we can skip the really basic stuff and get to the meat much quicker. Two years ago when I first went through training on my own, the first couple of hours was dedicated to learning the interface and finding your way around the program. Those are valuable training hours that we can better use doing anything other than "... and this is the Project Browser." That could really pay off in the long run.
We also need to decide what our training/pilot project will be. That is one other aspect that I really like is the fact that we will be using a Revit Architecture file from one of our best clients to do the training. Real-life training instead of everything being sanitized and only from the training manual.
This is going to be good. I'm feeling much better than I did before about the setup stage. It's far from over and there are many obstacles to overcome, but the guys at Avatech are making it a little more "warm & fuzzy" at this point.
It is T-minus 13 days and counting. Time to rally the troops. More to come as I/we get closer to Zero Hour.
The results? My doubts are hereby (almost) completely withdrawn.
What I thought was going to be tough to fit into the 2 weeks before our training starts will be taken care of without a problem.
What I thought was going to be 2 days worth of work in our office actually only took me a few hours.
Sometimes I think too much. Ya' think maybe?
Why? Because the Specialist will be creating the content we need (on his computer down in the heart of Texas) prior to the commencement of training. I uploaded a package of all that he needed, which included things like logos, linetype settings, layering info, text/dimension samples, and a number of other things. Standard stuff, really. But then, what else do you make templates out of anyway?
So, all I'm going to do now is try to get a little background "intro-training" for my people so they don't go into the classroom totally cold. If we go in there ahead of the game, we can skip the really basic stuff and get to the meat much quicker. Two years ago when I first went through training on my own, the first couple of hours was dedicated to learning the interface and finding your way around the program. Those are valuable training hours that we can better use doing anything other than "... and this is the Project Browser." That could really pay off in the long run.
We also need to decide what our training/pilot project will be. That is one other aspect that I really like is the fact that we will be using a Revit Architecture file from one of our best clients to do the training. Real-life training instead of everything being sanitized and only from the training manual.
This is going to be good. I'm feeling much better than I did before about the setup stage. It's far from over and there are many obstacles to overcome, but the guys at Avatech are making it a little more "warm & fuzzy" at this point.
It is T-minus 13 days and counting. Time to rally the troops. More to come as I/we get closer to Zero Hour.
Friday, May 16, 2008
RST Implementation Kick-Off
We have finally set a date for the initial "kick-off" meeting that starts the "pre-classroom" phase of the implementation: May 28th.
I am very much looking forward to getting this rolling, but I have to say that I am concerned about the small window of opportunity to get everything done before we hit the classroom. May 28th gives us eight (8) business days in which to pack a whole lot of prep before June 10th (when we go "back to school").
My concern is that Avatech will not be able to schedule their people to handle their end of the bargain during those eight days, and they will look to slide the training schedule. We wouldn't even sign their proposal in the first place until they committed to specific training dates. Why? Because we need to plan our whole schedule around those dates since the whole drafting department, our most experienced project engineer, and one of the partners will be out of the office during the three-day training session. Over half of our production staff will be unreachable during that time, and that is a hard item to try and coordinate - internally and outside of our office. I mean, we still have projects to work on during that time!
Don't get me wrong: I'm not saying that Avatech has dropped the ball or anything bad about them at all before 'it' hits the fan. On the contrary, I hope I'm dead wrong. Please make me look the fool! Implementation is their business and (hopefully) they know how to do it well. They do have considerable resources to pull from. I think it's just a small time frame to fit a lot of 'Revit-Prep' into. As we go through it, I'll be outlining exactly what it entails, but take me at my word that on paper it looks like "Whoa, Dude!"
It's time to put your Revit where your mouth is guys. Let's hope they can step up to the plate like David Ortiz instead of the playoff version of A-Rod.
Did the Red Sox fan in me just show up out of nowhere?
I am very much looking forward to getting this rolling, but I have to say that I am concerned about the small window of opportunity to get everything done before we hit the classroom. May 28th gives us eight (8) business days in which to pack a whole lot of prep before June 10th (when we go "back to school").
My concern is that Avatech will not be able to schedule their people to handle their end of the bargain during those eight days, and they will look to slide the training schedule. We wouldn't even sign their proposal in the first place until they committed to specific training dates. Why? Because we need to plan our whole schedule around those dates since the whole drafting department, our most experienced project engineer, and one of the partners will be out of the office during the three-day training session. Over half of our production staff will be unreachable during that time, and that is a hard item to try and coordinate - internally and outside of our office. I mean, we still have projects to work on during that time!
Don't get me wrong: I'm not saying that Avatech has dropped the ball or anything bad about them at all before 'it' hits the fan. On the contrary, I hope I'm dead wrong. Please make me look the fool! Implementation is their business and (hopefully) they know how to do it well. They do have considerable resources to pull from. I think it's just a small time frame to fit a lot of 'Revit-Prep' into. As we go through it, I'll be outlining exactly what it entails, but take me at my word that on paper it looks like "Whoa, Dude!"
It's time to put your Revit where your mouth is guys. Let's hope they can step up to the plate like David Ortiz instead of the playoff version of A-Rod.
Did the Red Sox fan in me just show up out of nowhere?
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